Part 13 (1/2)

There was urgent need of haste. On Friday, while the flames were still making their way onward, General Funston telegraphed: ”Famine seems inevitable.” The people of the country took a more hopeful view of it, and by Sat.u.r.day night the spectre of famine was definitely driven from the field and food for all the fugitives was within reach.

THE SYMPATHY OF THE PEOPLE AWAKES.

On all sides the people were awake and doing. In all the great cities agencies to receive contributions were opened, and many of the newspapers undertook the task of collecting and forwarding supplies. The smaller towns were equally alert in furnis.h.i.+ng their quota to the good work, and from countryside and village contributions were forwarded until the fund acc.u.mulated to an unprecedented amount. Collections were made in factories, in stores, in offices, in the public schools; cash boxes or globes stood in all frequented places and were rapidly filled with bank notes; theatrical and musical entertainments were given for the benefit of the earthquake sufferers; never had there been such an awakening. As an instance of the spirit displayed, one man came running into a banking house and threw a thousand dollar bill on the counter.

”For San Francisco,” he said, as he turned toward the door.

”What name?” asked the teller.

”Put it down to 'cash,'” he answered, as he vanished.

Rapidly the fund acc.u.mulated. A few days brought it up to the $5,000,000 mark. Then it grew to $10,000,000. Within ten days' time the relief fund was estimated at $18,000,000, and the good work was still going on--in less profusion, it is true, but still the spirit was alive.

FOREIGN OFFERS OF AID.

The generous impulse was not confined to the United States. From all countries came offers of aid. Canada was promptly in the field, and the chief nations of Europe were quick to follow, while j.a.pan made a generous offer, and in far Australia funds were started at the various cities for the sufferers. No doubt a large sum from foreign lands would have been available had not President Roosevelt declined to accept contributions from abroad, as not needed in view of America's abundant response. To the Hamburg-Line which offered $25,000, the following letter was sent:

”The President deeply appreciates your message of sympathy, and desires me to thank you heartily for the kind offer of outside aid. Although declining, the President earnestly wishes you to understand how much he appreciates your cordial and generous sympathy.”

All other offerings from abroad were in the same thankful spirit declined, even those from our immediate neighbors, Canada and Mexico.

Some feeling was aroused by this, especially in the relief committee at San Francisco, which felt that the need of that city was so great and urgent that no offer of relief should have been declined. In response the President explained that he only spoke for the government, in his official capacity, and that San Francisco was in no sense debarred from accepting any contributions made directly to it.

It may justly be said for the people of this country that their spontaneous generosity in the presence of a great calamity, either at home or abroad, is always magnificent. It never waits for solicitation.

It does not delay even until the necessity is demonstrated, but it a.s.sumes that where there is great destruction of property and homes are swept away there must be distress which calls for immediate relief.

There is one ray of light in the gloom caused by the calamity at San Francisco. A truly splendid display of brotherly love and sympathy has been shown by the people of this country, and a similar display was ready to be shown by the people of the civilized world had it been felt that the occasion demanded it and that the exigency surpa.s.sed the power of our people to meet it.

ENTERPRISE IN SAN FRANCISCO.

In the face of an appalling and death-dealing disaster, rendering an entire community dependent for the bare necessities of life and putting it in imminent danger of greater horrors, the nation has been stirred as it has rarely been before, and there have been awakened those deeper feelings of brotherhood which are referred to in the oft-quoted pa.s.sage that ”one touch of nature makes the whole world akin.”

The nature indicated in this instance is human nature in its highest manifestation, the sympathetic sentiment that stirs deeply in all our hearts and needs but the occasion to make itself warmly manifested.

There is something incomparably splendid in the spectacle of an entire nation straining every nerve to send succor to the helpless and the suffering, and this spectacle has warmed the hearts of our people to the uttermost and inspired them to make the most strenuous efforts to drive away the gaunt wolf of famine from the ruined homes of our far Pacific brethren.

It may be said that San Francisco will be willing to accept this relief only so long as stern necessity demands it. At this writing only two weeks have pa.s.sed since the dread calamity, and already active steps are being taken to provide for themselves. As an example of their enterprise, it may be said that their newspapers hardly suspended at all, the Evening Post alone suspending publication for a time from being unable to acquire a plant in the vicinity of the city. When the conflagration made it apparent that all plants would be destroyed, the Bulletin put at work a force in its composing rooms, a hand-bill was set and some hundreds of copies run off on the proof-press, giving the salient features of the day's news.

The morning papers, the Call, Chronicle and Examiner, retired to Oakland, on the other side of the bay, and there, on Thursday morning, issued a joint paper from the office of the Oakland Tribune. On Friday morning they split forces again, the Examiner retaining the use of the Tribune plant and the Call and Chronicle issuing from the office of the Oakland Herald. Two days later the Call secured the service of the Oakland Enquirer plant. Meantime, on Friday, the Bulletin, after a suspension of one day, made arrangements for the use in the afternoon of the Oakland Herald equipment, and from these sources and under such circ.u.mstances the San Francisco papers have been issuing.

Offices were hurriedly opened on Fillmore Street, which today is the main thoroughfare of San Francisco, and from these headquarters the news of the day as it is gathered is transmitted by means of automobiles and ferry service to the Oakland sh.o.r.e.

There also were accepted such advertis.e.m.e.nts as had been offered. The number of these was, perhaps, the best visual sign of the resurrection of the new city. It was noted that in a fourteen-page paper printed within two weeks after the fire by the Examiner there were over nine pages of advertis.e.m.e.nts, and in a sixteen-page paper published by the Chronicle at least fifty per cent. of its s.p.a.ce was devoted to the same end.